Mike Skinner "winces slightly" when he hears The Streets’ hit ‘Fit But You Know It’.
The frontman has insisted that whilst the song from the group’s 2004 album ‘A Grand Don’t Come for Free’ hasn’t aged well, his back catalogue pays the bills.
But, he does have "empathy" towards how the world has changed and he grimaces whenever he hears the track, which features the line: "See, I reckon you’re about an eight or a nine
Maybe even nine and a half in four beers’ time."
Speaking to the Headliners podcast, he confessed: "I slightly wince at ‘Fit But You Know It’.
"I think the world changes.
"I never revisit material, but obviously others do revisit it and I rely on that because that’s how I pay the bills.
"I just think I’m getting old now and the world gradually becomes unrecognisable to the one that you were born into and that’s OK.
"I think we should probably have empathy for how much the world has changed."
The 41-year-old star – who had four top ten hits in the UK as The Streets, including number one ‘Dry Your Eyes’ – recently returned under the alias for the star-studded mixtape, ‘None Of Us Are Getting Out Of This Life Alive’, which features the likes of Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker, indie rockers IDLES and Ms Banks.
And whilst promoting the release, he admitted that some of his most popular hits might look dated by present-day standards, but he thinks social media users need to be more conscious of contextual factors before they criticise his work.
Mike reflected: "I think social media is going to have to find a way of addressing the context thing.
"I think context exists in the real world, what someone looks like is quite important to what they’re saying. And on Twitter you don’t get that to any sort of satisfactory level.
"And it also works when you’re looking back at stuff. So probably at best ‘Fit But You Know It’ can just be seen as something cheeky that’s maybe of its time.
"In context of FHM culture and Nuts magazine, it’s probably a bit more woke than that, but definitely less woke than now."